u/Active-Okras

I have been counting calories in some form or another since i was about 32. What started as something innocent eventually spiraled into a full eating disorder. I won't go into too much detail but at my worst I was terrified of food in a way that is really hard to explain to someone who hasn't experienced it. Every meal felt like a negotiation and every number was a moral judgment for me.

My therapist suggested intuitive eating as part of recovery and honestly my first reaction was pure fear. Eating without rules felt genuinely dangerous to my brain.

So here's how the 4 months actually went

The hardest month was the first one ofcc. I was scared to eat, but not in a casual way but in a very real, sitting in front of a meal and feeling my heart rate go up. What if I overeat? What if I can't stop? What if I gain weight again? Without numbers to tell me I was allowed to eat something I felt completely out of control.

I ate past fullness sometimes and felt enormous guilt about it. I underate other times because old habits don't disappear overnight and I cried about food more times than I want to admit.

During the second month it was hard but differently hard. The acute fear started softening into something more like discomfort which felt like progress. I started recognizing actual hunger signals for the first time in years, which was a big step for me already. I finally stopped reaching for my calorie app out of habit around week 6 which felt like a genuinely huge moment. The obsessive food thoughts started coming less frequently which anyone with an eating disorder history will understand is actually massive!

At month 3 food started feeling neutral: not good, not bad, just food. I could sit at a restaurant and look at a menu without immediately calculating or panicking. I wasn't thinking about food constantly anymore which sounds so simple but when your brain has been fixated on it for years the quiet is actually overwhelming at first

I'm at month 4 now and I feel like a different person in my relationship with food. Not perfect ofc, recovery is not linear and I understand that, but the mental load has lifted in a way I didn't think was possible

Now I eat when i'm hungry and I stop when i'm full. I eat things I used to label as forbidden without the guilt spiral that used to follow. I didn't lose weight and didn't gain either, but honestly that stopped being the metric I was measuring all the time.

If you're coming from an eating disorder background and considering intuitive eating i would strongly recommend doing it with professional support because first month is really hard and having someone in your corner matters.

The relationship you build with your body on the other side of this is worth every scary moment! I believe in us💗

For context, I am a person who has been drinking coffee first thing in the morning for years, not because i particularly love the taste anymore but because the idea of functioning without it felt genuinely impossible😭

The other day my friend was bragging about how morning yoga changed her life so I decided to test whether the energy i was getting from coffee was real or whether i was just addicted to the ritual of it. So for 3 weeks I set my alarm 30 minutes earlier and did yoga instead of reaching for the coffee maker

Week 1:
Absolutely. Freaking. Awful. The headaches were real, the fatigue was real and i was not a pleasant person to be around...feel bad for my family and coworkers lowkey. I did the yoga but I was doing it with the energy and enthusiasm of a person who wanted to be horizontal. I almost gave up on day 4.

Week 2:
Something started shifting around day 8 or 9. I was waking up slightly less like a zombie. the yoga was starting to feel less like punishment and more like something my body actually wanted. I still missed coffee but it wasn't desperate anymore

Week 3:
Okay i have to be honest here: I didn't completely stop missing coffee but my energy levels throughout the day were noticeably more stable. No 3pm crash which has been my entire personality for years, and i was falling asleep faster at night.

To summorize, I drink one coffee now instead of three and it actually tastes good again because I'm not depending on it. The yoga genuinely changed my morning energy more than i expected so I’m planning g to sign up for actual yoga classes in the studio. It works, guys!!
Would I recommend it? Absolutely, but survive week 1 first heheeee

Sooo my screen time app told me i was spending 9+ hours a day on social media and instead of reflecting on that like a normal person i decided to just delete everything and see what happened👍
Days 1-2:
Genuinely humbling cuz i picked up my phone probably 50 times out of pure muscle memory just to stare at a blank home screen like someone who had lost everything. I didn't realize how much of my day was just scrolling. Not even enjoying it, just doing it, it's like a drug addiction I swear! I cleaned my entire apartment on day 2 out of sheer desperation for something to do with my hands
Days 3-4:
Starting to feel slightly less anxious but also very aware that I had no idea what to do with myself. Read an actual book for the first time in months and also realized nobody texted me which means my entire social life was conducted exclusively through memes and instagram reposts...
Days 5-6:
Something genuinely shifted. I forgot to check my phone for two hours on day 5 which has not happened since maybeee 2013??? Also my brain started feeling quieter, I slept better and did not miss the drama even a little bit lol.
Day 7:
Completed the week yaaay, reinstalled everything out of curiosity and felt immediately overwhelmed and overstimulated. Deleted half of the apps again within 20 minutes hahaha

Conclusion:
Less anxiety, better sleep, actually finished things i started. The first two days were rough but after that it genuinely got easier.
Actually now considering making this a monthly reset
Has anyone else tried this?